Highlights
- Star Wars video games predominantly focus on the Galactic Civil War era, leading to repetitive gameplay and a lack of innovation.
- Exploring lesser-seen eras, such as the Thrawn era, would provide fresh and exciting content for Star Wars video games.
- Video games have the potential to fill in gaps and expand on the lore of new era, like the Thrawn era, which movies and TV shows may not have time to cover.
The canon Star Wars timeline now has quite a few different eras. When Star Wars first released, the Galactic Civil War was the only era that held any importance, with a mysterious Clone Wars simply being mentioned as part of a throwaway comment by Obi-Wan. Then the Clone Wars received its time in the spotlight with the prequel trilogy, and then the sequel trilogy established the New Republic era, and various comics and novels have brought about the High Republic era in the years since. When it comes to setting a Star Wars video game, there are a ton of different eras to choose from now, but time and time again they choose the safest option.
The vast majority of Star Wars video games take place in the Galactic Civil War era, and while it's always fun to fight alongside the Rebellion and take down Stormtroopers, fans have gone through those same motions over and over again in the last three decades. It's time for Star Wars video games to embrace some lesser-seen eras, and a perfect place to start would be one that's brand new, the era of Thrawn.
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Star Wars' Thrawn Era Is Perfect for Video Games
How Ahsoka Has Started a New Era for Star Wars
For those who haven't caught up yet, Disney+'s Star Wars Ahsoka show may have just ushered in a brand-new era for the canon Star Wars timeline. The general plot of Ahsoka sees the titular former Jedi try and put a stop to the Imperial Remnant's plans to rescue Grand Admiral Thrawn, who was trapped in a different galaxy alongside the Jedi Ezra Bridger during the Star Wars Rebels finale.
Failing to stop them from reaching the other galaxy, Ahsoka makes her own way there, and once on the planet, she continues her efforts to stop Thrawn from escaping the galaxy, believing he'll bring a new war to the galaxy if he returns. Ahsoka's finale sees her fail in her mission, allowing Thrawn to return to the main Star Wars galaxy. With no mention of any of this in future-set Star Wars media like the sequel trilogy, it's unclear just how much of an impact this will have on the overarching Star Wars universe, but it could end up being the beginning of a whole new era, acting as a continuation of the Galactic Civil War, but with some major changes.
Video Games Can Help Fill in the Gaps of Thrawn's New Era
One of the biggest issues fans had with Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and eventually the sequel trilogy as a whole, was the lack of world-building. In the original Star Wars trilogy, an entire galaxy's shared 20-year history is fleshed out surprisingly well, along with its main factions and a wealth of important characters. The sequel trilogy, on the other hand, has frequent issues with world-building, never really explaining the state of the galaxy at that time, where its main factions came from, or why the First Order posed such a big threat.
The Star Wars sequel trilogy was in desperate need of some additional canon material, and video games would have fit the bill perfectly. Unfortunately, the few video games set during the sequel trilogy didn't really expand on much of the era's lore, leaving the era still feeling a bit empty all these years later. If this Thrawn era is going to be the new and big thing for Star Wars, then it can't repeat the same mistake. While movies and TV shows will hopefully be enough to flesh out this new Thrawn era, a few video games wouldn't hurt, helping to fill in various gaps in the lore that the rest just don't have the time to cover.
Star Wars
Star Wars is a multimedia franchise originally created by George Lucas and Lucasfilm Ltd with the 1977 motion picture. The science fiction franchise follows the adventures of characters (both humanoid and alien) in outer space including those who can wield a mystical power known as the Force. Since the release of the original trilogy of movies, the franchise has expanded to include multiple films and branched out to other media like comics, video games, tv shows, theme park attractions, and more. The IP and Lucasfilm were sold to Disney in 2012.
